Building off this post, there's a difference between a reporter and a Very Serious Person. Just because I'm drawing a distinction between reporting and opinion writing doesn't mean I'm siding with the villagers over the DFHs.
This is all well trod territory, but it's worth repeating in my own words since this is my blog. Villagers fancy themselves reporters, but their work (consciously or unconsciously) does not illuminate in the way a real reporter's work would. Villagers reinforce the status quo out of a sense of cultural identification. Because they are Very Serious, they can pass off their ideological preferences as simply common sense or conventional wisdom.
Villagers don't explain how the world works, they are active participants in keeping the world running a certain way.
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